In the months when every publisher was working out what to put on an iPad, the most interesting answer came from Sweden. The publisher Bonnier worked with the design firm BERG on how magazine content might actually behave on a tablet, and the resulting prototype, Mag+, went past the standard approach of reproducing the text on a screen with a video parked next to it.
Bonnier’s research and development team described the intention as using the power of digital media to create a rich and meaningful experience while keeping the relaxed, curated qualities of a printed magazine. The design assumption behind it is the part that has aged well: it was built for a world in which interactivity, abundant information and unlimited options could be experienced as intrusive and overwhelming rather than as features.
The Guardian ran a round-up of other proposals for print on the iPad at the time. None of them was as imaginative as this one.